___ ._ limited ability to control their I 14 p|«c supply and thus the price they “ ask for their goods. So, they 'Continued From Page 24) accept a lower price in order to move the merchandise. uncommon; i.e., a firm pays its factor suppliers a lower price, forcing them to bear all or a portion of the tax. Or a firm decides to absorb all or part of the VAT itself rather than lose a sale. And, some industries— especially those less con centrated —are less ;r likely than • others to push the tax forward. Agriculture is among those in dustries. “Price takers” As the economists say, farmers jin the short run are “price takers,” meaning they have lANCO BEDDING FOR POULTRY ft LIVESTOCK WOOD SHAVINGS .Bag or Bulked Complete Distribution by Your Specification in Poultry House by blower.+ + 5 Ton or More Order. CAU 299-3541 mam RMfunr ■ DANIEL S. ESH Box 351, RDI Ronks, Pa. COMPLETE BARN AND INDUSTRIAL PAINTING Water proofing on block walls <5 year guarantee) Write for Free Estimates and Service. On balance it would seem U.S agriculture would not be in a favorable position relative to other industries. Agriculture would probably be forced to absorb part of the VAT, par ticularly in the short run. Meanwhile, the farmer as a - consumer would still bear some the VAT. The burden on farmers would be even heavier if they ended up being saddled with more VAT on purchased inputs than they were able to shift forward on their sales. ..all the more reason for special treatment for agriculture. Why not simply exclude agriculture from VAT coverage? Poor Alternative Exemption is not the answer, says one ERS tax specialist. Farmers would still be subject to the VAT on what they buy to run the farm business. Outside the VAT umbrella they’s have no way of offsetting the tax paid on inputs. The EC likewise recognizes that exclusion from the VAT would penealize farmers rather than help them. But to make things easier, the EC Council offers a plan whereby farmers can be relieved 1 from keeping purchase invoices and from direct liability under the VAT. Agriculture is not exempt, however, as the liability for the farmer’s VAT is assumed by the purchaser of farm output. The EC’s handling of the VAT is being closely examined by tax experts in this country. Most of the current literature on the VAT, and whether it should be built into the U.S. tax structure, draws on the EC experience with this system. The trouble is, the stated goal of the EC’s VAT is to make the consumer bear the full tax. That’s precisely what many people in this country don’t want. Yet there’s more than one way to apply the VAT.Since the EC views the VAT as a direct con sumer tax, it-has chosen the method for tax computation that best suits the objective. The “credit” method, as it’s known, operates as in the example given earlier. Alternative methods are available that would minimize the forward shifting of the VAT for all industries. The alter natives—“addition”and “ac counts”—basically provide for a tax on wages and profits and other production factors. But the VAT would be computed from information generally contained in existing tax forms, and paid along with other business taxes. It could still be shifted indirectly, though the odds of this happening are less than under the EC’s credit method. Lancaster Farming, Saturday, April 14,1973 Farm Womeh Council Society of Farm Women of Lancaster County held an executive board meeting recently. Mrs. Jay Landis of Society 22 was hostess. Co hostesses were Mrs. John Metz and Mrs. Sterling Elmer of Society 25 and Mrs. Uobert Hess of Society 28 led devotions. Without going into detail here, the addition method especially lends itself to charging variable rates of taxation when the object is to give special treatment to certain industries such as far ming. Turning to the proposals for a VAT in this country, most center around using VAT to finance education, replacing all or part of the property tax. Farmers ob viously would be afffected. In a recent year they paid taxes on farm property of nearly 3 billion—or about 9 percent of total property collections. Fatter Tax Bills? Under one proposal farmers wouldn’t get much tax relief. This proposal calls for a Federal VAT to take the place of State and local taxes on residential property only. States would still be permitted to levy a tax on nonresidential property such as farmland. Since farmland is generally underassessed com pared with other types of property, there’s a strong possibility of raised assessments followed by fatter tax bills should assessment be centralized in the States. If on the other hand, all property taxes are replaced by a VAT, then farmers might come out ahead of the game. The latest data for estimating the benefits to farmers are for 1963. Had there been a VAT that year, the burden on agriculture would have come to roughly 1.3 billion—slightly less than half what farmers paid in real estate taxes. Suppose prices paid fanners failed to rise in line with the VAT costs? Under the worst possible assumptions, farmers’ VAT payments would not be much higher than the property taxes they pay now. It was decided that the county P'oject for this year will be the Welsh Mountain Medical Center. The Homemakers Clubs from Wayne County, Michigan, will arrive on May 2 at the Farm and Home Center. The Farm Women will give demonstrationsj. to these ladies that morning. The demonstrations will in clude: schnitz and knepp made by Mrs. Paul Witman of Society 8; Mrs. Robert Noll of Society 18 will make chicken pot pie; Mrs. James Garber of Society 27 will demonstrate table arrangements, and Mrs. Milton Eberly of Society 6 will display ceramic doll and tole painting; Mrs Clyde Buchen of Society 26 will do egg decorating, and Mrs Mary Sarver will make a funnel cake. After the demonstrations, the Farm Women will serve their guests lunch consisting of chicken corn soup, chow-chow, homemade bread, apple butter, egg cheese and shoo fly pie. The next board meeting will be on June 5 with hostess Mrs Harry Shonk of Society 6. Northern 4-H Conservation Club Sees Film The first meeting of the Nor thern 4-H Soil and Water Club was held with Mr. Irwin discussing the real meaning of 4- H with the members. He ex plained what members can dp after they are too old to be a 4-H member. After the discussion, Mr. Irwin showed films having to do with conservation in the forest. The first one was entitled “The Forest”. It showed the forest in many uses, such as lumber, water power and recreation. The second film was entitled “The Eternal Forest”. The film traced its way from early man all she way up to now. During the discussion, Donald Martin set up an experiment on distilling water At the end of the discussion, there was about three ounces of pure water in the bottle. Mrs Diemler served refresh ments after the meeting. Donald Martin, News Reporter •KW MILK •MM MW •MORE MOOT MADISON SILOS Div. Chromalloy American Corp. 1070SteinmetzRd Ephrata, Penna. 17522 Ph. 733-1206 LOCAL DEALERS Frank Snyder Akron Caleb Wenger Quarryville Landis Bros. Inc. Lancaster Carl L. Shirk Lebanon Sollenberger Farm Supply Centerport, Pa. Ph. 215-926-7671 25 859-2688 548-2116 393-3906 867-3741
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers